“They’ll manage, no doubt,” Hastings said, seeming to choose his words carefully. “Let Seph go now.” He took a step forward, and Leicester raised his hand again.
“I’ll need to restrain you first.” Leicester nodded to the alumni. They converged on the wizard, but stopped about four feet away, as if hitting a wall, unable to approach.
Leicester sighed and flattened Seph’s right hand against the table next to the chair. He isolated the little finger, pulling it away from the others, then picked up a knife from the table, the same as he had used before. Seph watched in horrified fascination, his breathing quick and shallow, his hand pink and vulnerable against the bleached wood of the tabletop.
Hastings saw what Leicester had in mind. “I give,” he said quickly.
“That’s better,” said Leicester.
The alumni shackled Hastings’s hands with a heavy chain.
“The torc.” Leicester nodded to Martin Hall.
Martin opened a jeweled box on the table and brought out a glittering gold band, etched with runes and studded with jewels. He encircled Hastings’s neck with it, being careful not to touch the wizard. Martin’s hands were shaking, and it took him several tries to close it. Once fastened, the metal immediately tarnished and the jewels darkened, like stars blinking out.
Hastings ran a finger under the collar. “Now this is a rare piece, Gregory. Who did you steal it from?”
Leicester smiled. “It came from the Hoard, of course. I’ll actually miss having the Dragon at large. He always gets the blame for everything that goes missing. The curator assured me it would keep you quite docile for the time you have left.”
Leicester’s weight shifted, his grip tightening on the hand on the table. Seph had time to close his eyes before the blade came down. There was a terrible pain in his right hand, and he had to work on it a while, convince himself it was somebody else’s hand and somebody else’s pain, lose his affection for what had been taken from him.
It took a minute, and several deep breaths, but when he opened his eyes he could look at his hand with some detachment. It was not his little finger, but the tips of his middle and ring finger that had been clipped off, across the nail, even with his forefinger. They were bleeding heavily, blood staining the unfinished wood of the table.
Seph took another deep breath, lifted his chin, and looked straight across the room at Hastings. The wizard held his gaze for a moment. His face was impassive, but Seph could feel his anger, like a beast crouching in the room.
Hastings shifted his eyes to Leicester. “I won’t forget this,” he said softly.
“That’s the idea,” Leicester said, smiling. “I needed to verify that the restraints are working. You see, I can’t release the boy after all. I have plans for him.”
Hastings’s eyes flicked from the alumni to Seph, and back to Leicester. “Plans?”
“I’ve offered Joseph a place in my collaborative. I can be very persuasive.” He wiped the bloody knife on Seph’s shirt and carelessly dropped it back onto the table beside him. “Once we come to an agreement, he’ll play a special role in the upcoming conference.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“I’m going to use him to destroy the conference participants. Beginning with you.”
By the time they reached the cellar, Seph was close to fainting. He remained upright only through the efforts of Martin and Peter, who gripped his elbows. Peter wrapped Seph’s shirttail around the bleeding hand, surreptitiously applying pressure.
Hastings surveyed the cellar chamber, frowning like a guest in a substandard hotel: Seph’s mattress in one corner, his pile of clothes next to it, Leicester’s awful worktable as the centerpiece. The room was cavelike, roughly square, perhaps twenty by twenty feet, with a damp stone floor and a moist, organic odor. One corner of it had been dry-walled into a crude enclosure containing a shower and toilet. Electrical conduits had been run across the ceiling to a light fixture in the center sprouting four bare bulbs that shed a harsh light over the center of the room. The corners were shrouded in darkness.
“Let’s hope the rest of the inn is a bit more comfortable.” Hastings turned to the half dozen alumni who had escorted them down. “We’ll need dressings, bandages, and antiseptic. Bring down some bedding, towels and soap, and a change of clothes for him.” He issued orders as easily as if he were master of the house, welcoming a guest, rather than a prisoner. He turned to Seph. “What would you like to eat?”
Seph shook his head and slid down against the wall until he was sitting against it. He closed his eyes, resting his injured hand over his heart.
“Bring us something anyway,” Hastings directed the alumni. “I’ll see if I can persuade him to eat something.”
“Yes, sir.” The alumni practically bowed their way out. Seph heard a bolt sliding into place on the other side of the door.
“Dr. Leicester’s students are not used to thinking for themselves,” Hastings said. He knelt next to Seph. “Now let me see the hand.”
Seph kept his hand folded tightly against his chest, ignoring the blood soaking into his shirt. “Is it true?”
Hastings sat back on his heels. “I am your father, yes. I’m sorry our first meeting as father and son has to take place under these circumstances.”
“How long have you known about me?”
“I found out about you three days ago. Unfortunately, from Gregory Leicester.”
“Somebody knew about me.” Seph kept his eyes on Hastings’s face, drinking in the detail.
“Yes. Somebody did.” The wizard took Seph’s hand and unfolded the bleeding fingers, wrapped them in the shirttail, applied gentle pressure.
“Who?”
“Your mother.” The wizard spoke matter-of-factly, with none of the drama warranted by this revelation.
“My mother.” And then, afraid he would die in the instant before he asked the question, he plunged on. “Who?”
“Perhaps it’s best to discuss that when you’re out of Leicester’s hands.” Hastings said it as if rescue was just hours away. “He doesn’t appear to know who your mother is, and I would prefer to keep it that way.”
Seph wrenched his hand free. “No. I’ve waited long enough. Gregory Leicester had to introduce me to my father, but you’re going to tell me who my mother is.”
Hastings inclined his head slightly. “All right.” He spun out a gossamer thread from his fingertips, fine as a spiderweb, casting it into a large circle around them on the floor until it enclosed half the room. At Seph’s puzzled look, he said only, “Discourages eavesdropping.”
The wizard massaged his forehead with his thumb and forefinger, as if he were a man who found it hard to give up secrets. “It’s Linda Downey.”
Linda Downey. Who seemed to know him so well, his habits, his favorite foods. Who’d pretended to be his guardian. Who was building a house for them in Trinity.
Nick Snowbeard’s words came back to him. Linda and Hastings were involved, years ago.
Seph scarcely noticed when Hastings picked up his hand again. He felt a slight tingling now, replacing the pain. Hastings pulled a small bottle from a pouch at his belt, uncorked it, and handed it to Seph. Seph took a cautious sip. “Finish it,” Hastings ordered, and Seph drained the bottle. It spread through him, warming him.
Hastings sat down next to Seph, shoulder to shoulder, against the wall, still keeping hold of his hand. The wizard’s strength flowed into him, the pain fleeing before it.
Hastings smiled. “I guess I still have a little power in me, despite the torc.”
“What do you mean? What does it do?”
Hastings shrugged. “It drains power.”
“Oh. They gave me Weirsbane.”
“It seems we are a dangerous pair.”
Seph liked the notion of being dangerous, in league with his father.
Hastings returned to the topic of relationships. “Your mother cares for you very much. She’s been beside herself these last few days
.”
“If you say so.”
“She was only trying to protect you, Seph.”
“Right. It was for my own good. Now I understand why I’ve been an orphan my whole life.” They’d lied to him. They’d all lied to him. Genevieve. His own mother.
Hastings closed his eyes, as if trying to summon the right words. “She wasn’t much older than you when we met. But she’d been through a lot, at the hands of wizards. Have you ever heard of the Trade?”
Seph shook his head.
“It’s an underground slave market, run by wizards, dealing in the gifted. Warriors and enchanters, mostly. Linda was ensnared in it, for a time. That’s how we met. I was already fighting the Trade. She joined me.
“It was a dangerous business. We were always on the move, working our network of spies, living under assumed names. Linda was especially good at it, because wizards tend to underestimate enchanters.
“It’s likely we would have been caught, eventually. But when you’re young, you think you’re immortal. And in wartime, you don’t really think about the future.
“Then she disappeared. I was sure she’d been taken back to the Trade. But in fact, she’d discovered she was expecting you.”
Seph tried to imagine a very young Linda Downey, what it must have been like.
“She knew you’d be a target if our enemies ever discovered your existence. So she gave you up.”
“Why didn’t she tell you?”
Hastings shrugged. “She didn’t trust me to support that decision, and she was right. My family—your family —my father and brother and sister were all murdered by the Roses. No one’s left. I would have refused to give up the only family I have. My son.
“She couldn’t entirely give you up, either. She watched over you, arranged for your schooling, received progress reports. That’s how Leicester and D’Orsay found out about you.”
Seph leaned his head back against the wall. “All my life, I’ve dreamed of this. I’ve finally found my parents, and now . . . Leicester is going to torture me until I agree to link to him. When I do, he’ll force me to murder you, and everyone else I care about.”
Hastings touched his arm. “Courage, Seph.”
Seph looked up, startled. It was the same phrase Linda Downey had used, the day she’d rescued him from the Havens.
“He should never have brought me here,” Hastings went on. “He should have killed me as soon as he had the chance. His need to show off, his desire to bully and intimidate people will be his downfall.”
“But he has what he wants,” Seph said. “Everyone’s heading right into his trap, and there’s nothing we can do.”
“I will not let Gregory Leicester lay a hand on you again,” Hastings said, looking him in the eyes. And despite all the evidence to the contrary, Seph believed him.
“There’s something else,” Seph said. “Madison is here. The girl from the Legends. The—ah—elicitor.”
Hastings sat up straighter. “Where is she?”
Seph shook his head. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen her since the night we landed. I don’t think they know she’s here.”
“We can’t let Leicester get hold of her. For several reasons.” Hastings pondered this.
Then they heard the snick of the bolt sliding back. Martin and Peter entered, bringing bedding materials, first-aid supplies, and two small folding cots. They also brought a change of clothes for Seph and a tray of leftovers from dinner. They set up the cots side by side in a corner, and spread out the blankets on top. They carried in a small wooden table and two chairs, and laid out the food. There was even a bottle of wine for Hastings, which Martin uncorked. “It’s last year’s Zin from Second Sister,” Martin explained. “Let me know what you think.”
And then they were gone, the bolt replaced. Hastings looked over at Seph. The corners of his mouth twitched. “I’ve stayed in better accommodations, but things are improving.”
Using his bound hands together, Hastings dressed Seph’s wounded hand with gauze, tying it off securely. Then Hastings unbuttoned Seph’s bloody shirt, and between the two of them, they pulled it off his shoulders. Seph put his hands carefully through the sleeves of the new shirt and managed to get it on and buttoned.
“Do you want to sit up at the table?” Hastings rose, a little awkwardly, to his feet. There was about three inches of play in the chain between his hands.
Seph shook his head. “I’m not hungry.” He felt entirely filled up with what he’d already learned. And consumed with what he stood to lose.
“I insist that you eat something,” Hastings said. “In a situation like this, it’s wise to eat when you can.”
Seph wondered how often his father had been in a situation like this. His parents were assassins, spies, operatives, in the thick of the rebellion. What would Jason say?
Hastings prepared a plate, pulling apart a piece of chicken so Seph could eat it easily with one hand, adding cheese, grapes, a slice of bread. He brought it over to where Seph was sitting against the wall. Then he brought him a glass of wine. Seph looked up at him, startled. “Go ahead and drink it, Seph. It might improve things if it’s any good.”
Despite his desperate situation, Seph felt cared for.
Hastings sat down next to him, balancing his own plate on his knees, the bottle of wine by his side.
“Where did the name ‘the Dragon’ come from?” Seph asked.
“Do you know the legend of how the magical guilds were founded?”
Seph shook his head. It hadn’t come up.
“Supposedly the guilds were sired by five cousins, who wandered into a magical valley in northern Britain centuries ago. There they found a powerful dragon guarding a hoard of fabulous treasure. Much of it consisted of precious stones mined in the valley itself, magical artifacts, and such. The dragon welcomed them to the valley and treated them as honored guests. However, the cousins were greedy and wanted to take the dragon’s hoard for themselves. One night they slipped into the treasure room beneath the sleeping dragon. When the dragon awoke, they swallowed the jewels they had stolen. Those became the first Weirstones, and conferred unique magical gifts on the cousins.”
The wine was having its effect. Seph leaned his head against Hastings’s shoulder. If anyone had told him he would be sitting in a dungeon on Second Sister listening to his father tell fairy tales, he would never have believed it.
Hastings drained his glass of wine, poured another. His hand shook a little, splashing wine onto the stone floor. For the first time Seph noticed that the wizard looked drawn and tired, with deep lines of weariness etched into his face.
“Are you all right?” Seph asked, feeling uneasy.
“It’s been a long day,” Hastings said. Then continued with his story. He was a surprisingly skilled storyteller.
“One of the cousins had swallowed the stone that delivered the gift of the spoken charm. That was the wizard, of course.
“So the wizard conjured a plan to overcome the dragon and take control of the magical valley. He charmed the others into submitting to him, because he needed the talents of the other cousins. The sorcerer prepared a powerful poison, the enchanter sang the dragon to sleep, the warrior poured the brew into his mouth, and so on. There are several versions of the story. Some say the dragon was killed outright. Others that he sleeps in the mountain to this day.
“Some say the story is just a fable. Some claim that one day the dragon will awake and right the wrong that was done by the magical guilds and kill us all. Others that the dragon will awake and free the under-guilds from the autocracy of wizards. Hence the name.”
They ate in silence for a few minutes. Then Hastings leaned his head back against the wall, looking up at the ceiling. When he spoke, it was almost as if he were talking to himself. “One wonders what a father should tell his son at a time like this.” He put his hands on his knees, the chains on his hands clanking softly. “I’ve spent my life in the pursuit of greatness. Great feats of courage, dari
ng acts of revenge, great demonstrations of hatred. Even great acts of love, when the opportunity presented itself.” He smiled.
“Your mother has accused me of being obsessed with taking revenge on the Roses for the loss of my family. And it’s true. The wrongs done to me have been an excuse for everything I’ve done: murder, betrayal, seduction, larceny. All for the cause. Very convenient.
“I was willing to sacrifice anything and anybody. It wasn’t until recently that I realized what I’d given up. Relationships are a series of small, daily sacrifices. Negotiations, compromises, and gray areas. You become enmeshed. It’s not well suited to someone on a mission.”
Seph shifted on the hard floor. Was Hastings trying to apologize for not being a better father? But he hadn’t even known Seph existed. “Why are you telling me this?”
“I see myself in you. I don’t want you to make the same mistakes I’ve made. I have to think it’s possible to suffer a great wrong and walk away from it. To build a life of small, exquisitely important moments.”
“But I still don’t . . .”
“Just promise me you’ll consider what I’ve said.”
Hastings lapsed into silence. Seph looked over a few minutes later and realized the wizard was asleep, leaning against the wall. Perhaps weariness and wine had prompted the speech.
Setting his plate aside, Seph stretched out on the cot closest to the wall. Hastings’s potion, whatever it was, was working. Between that and the wine, Seph could scarcely keep his eyes open.
It has been an awful and a tremendous day. It was tremendous, because he had found his father and learned about his mother. He tried not to think of the awful part, but it was there just the same, and it appeared that more awful things lay before him. But his father’s words came back to him, warming him.
I would have refused to give up the only family I have. My son.
And so he slept.
Chapter Eighteen
Reunions
First he noticed the harsh glare of the bare bulbs against his eyelids. Then he became aware of the sound of voices in quiet conversation nearby. For some reason, his right hand was bothering him, his fingers feeling fat like sausages, exceedingly tender. For a few blessed minutes, Seph forgot where he was. And then he remembered, and everything made sense but the voices, so he opened his eyes.